Insect and acarid pests destroy growing and harvested crops. In the United States, agronomic crops must compete with thousands of those pests. In particular tobacco budworms, southern armyworms and corn rootworms are especially devastating to crops. In spite of the commercial insecticides and acaricides available today, damage to crops, both growing and harvested, caused by insect and acarid pests still occurs. Accordingly, there is ongoing research to create new and more effective insecticidal and acaricidal agents.
Certain fluoroolefin compounds are known to possess insecticidal and acaricidal activity (see, e.g., U.S. Pat. No. 5,248,834; GB 2,288,803-A; WO 94/06741; WO 97/16067 and co-pending U.S. patent application Ser. No. 08/865,244 filed on May 29, 1997. However, the fluoroolefin compounds disclosed in those patents and patent applications are outside the scope of the present invention. U.S. Pat. No. 5,248,834 generically discloses certain 1-aryl-1-(3-aryl-1,2-difluoroprop-1-enyl)cyclopropane compounds. However, that patent does not provide a method to prepare those compounds. In fact, U.S. Pat. No. 5,248,834 does not provide a method to prepare any fluoroolefin compounds.
It is, therefore, an object of the present invention to provide compounds which are highly effective for the control of insect and acarid pests.
It is also an object of the present invention to provide a method for the control of insect and acarid pests.
It is a further object of this invention to provide a method for the protection of growing and harvested crops from damage caused by insect and acarid attack and infestation.
Those and other objects of the present invention will become more apparent from the detailed description thereof set forth below.